A passenger aircraft can include rows of reclinable seats for passengers. Each seat may include a gas spring that can facilitate reclining the seat. A gas spring can include a release mechanism that unlocks the gas spring. The release mechanism may be depressed to allow the gas spring to expand and contract freely. Therefore, depressing the release mechanism can allow the seat to be reclined to a desired position and freeing the release mechanism can lock the seat at the desired position.
An actuator can be used to cause the release mechanism to be engaged and allow the seat to recline. For example, the actuator may be a button that can be depressed to cause a pulling force to be applied to a cable. The cable can be coupled to a lever such that the lever is rotated, thereby causing a plunger coupled to the lever to depress the release mechanism. The lever can be coupled to a frame and the cable may coil around the frame such that the cable couples to the lever substantially parallel to the longitudinal axis of the gas spring and release mechanism. The coil in the cable can increase the total length of the cable, which can add resistance to the button and can increase the total weight of the cable.